A Lismore-based flight school is threatening to move its business elsewhere after the local council decides to dramatically increase the cost of landing planes at its airport.

Cash-strapped Lismore City Council voted to scrap its annual charge for airport users and instead introduce a per-landing fee.

Fast Aviation chief pilot Izaac Flanagan said that would amount to a 3,000 per cent increase and make his business unprofitable.

"Instead of being around $1,400 a year, it will be around $35,000 — depending on the amount of landings we do," Mr Flanagan said.

The council's decision mostly affects businesses such as flight schools, which do a large number of take-offs and landings. 

Council defends fee hike

Budget papers show the council-run airport has been running at a loss of around $800,000 a year, part of a wider problem within the council to claw its budget back into the black. 

The budget also revealed council's corporate charges for use of the airport have risen from $35,000 in 2020–21 to $218,000 in 2021–22.

A council spokesman said this reflected how costs — including insurance, IT and compliance — were "apportioned across the various services delivered by council".

Lismore City Council's aviation spokesman, Ashley Wing, said charges to airport users had not been at the level they should have been.

Mr Flanagan said he offered council to increase his annual fee by 30 per cent, but Lismore City Council rejected the offer. 

"How do you cope as a small business owner when the managers of a supplier your business depends on have no idea about how their own business works?" he said.

Most regional aerodromes offer an annual landing fee option as a way of trying to increase aviation business, particularly learn-to-fly schools.

Mr Flanagan said he was about to employ a full-time pilot but that had now been put on hold.

He said he was also in discussions with people about moving the business to Ballina.

"I'm hoping not to do that, but it's certainly an option," he said.

On the night the budget passed, Lismore councillors also passed a motion to begin community consultation after several complaints were received about increased noise from aircraft.

Mr Flanagan called on councillors to rescind the fee hike until there were workshops and community consultation. 

Passengers down almost 90 per cent

The number of commercial passengers coming through Lismore Regional Airport is down to around 10 per cent of its pre-pandemic level.

Around 90 passengers a month are flying to Lismore, compared to around 750 a month in the 2019–20 financial year.

"I think every airport and every aerodrome in the country that had commercial flights saw a sharp decrease, with people more reluctant to fly, either because of confidence generally or health orders in place or restrictions imposed on them," Mr Wing said.

Mr Wing said, while Ballina had the tourism market captured, he believed Lismore could still corner the business market.

"There's a lot of government agencies that reside in our city — from the hospital through to the university, TAFE. We've got the Supreme Court circuit as well, and the district courts, and a lot of wealth-management funds," he said.